The PACER Drainage Project: Instructions

Setting up a New Account (Skip Ahead if You Have One Already)

The process for setting up a PACER account is pretty quick and easy if
it goes smoothly. To set up an account, go to the registration site and
create an
account.
Most of the fields will be self-explanatory. At the bottom, if you’re in
doubt, select “Individual” for your “User Type”. On the second screen
you’ll set up a user name, password, and security questions, and on the
third screen, you’ll need to give payment information (this is required,
but won’t be used).

If this all goes well, you should have a functioning PACER account at
this point. A few times we’ve seen that payment information fails the
verification process and then needs either human review or to be reentered:

If
you run into this problem, log into
PACER (ignore the
client code field), then go to Account
Management. From
there, you should be able to fix the problem, but sometimes this error
is shown due to duplicate account or other non-credit card errors. In
that case, call in to get your account working: (800) 676-6856. We
have never had to wait 7-10 days to get an account working.

Install RECAP

Testing Things and Checking Your Balance

If your account is set up properly, you’ll be able to log into
PACER (ignore the
client code field). When you do that, if RECAP is installed correctly,
you’ll see a notification in your browser stating that “RECAP is
Activated” (if this is a Chrome browser you may need to look for a bell
icon). Great.

If you’re using an existing account, before you begin, you should check
your remaining balance for the quarter. To do this, go to the Billing
History
page,
click on “This Quarter” and hit submit. PACER gives you $15 of free
downloads per quarter. If you exceed that amount by even a penny, you
pay the entire amount, so check this amount carefully and always stay
below the $15 threshold.

Problems?

Thank You

Getting an account, providing your credit card number, and downloading
these documents is a lot of work. We’re very grateful for your help and
we’re hopeful that we can push the needle with this initiative. If
enough people use their quarterly allotment every quarter, we believe
PACER will notice. At the same time, you’re helping to build the public
domain, and we’re making the case that people want this content and are
willing to work for it.

Eventually, with enough effort, the PACER paywall will come down.
When that happens you’ll be able to take pride in having played your
part of the process. Thank you for contributing to the public domain!

What Else?

If you’ve spent your $15 and you still have energy to work on the
PACER
problem,
there’s more you can do: